Ukraine updates: US announces $400 million in military aid

The White House announced a new $400 million (€394 million) military aid package for Ukraine on Thursday that will include air defense systems.

Jake Sullivan, the White House national security adviser, said the package includes "important air defense contributions" such as missiles for Hawk air defense systems as well as US Avenger air defense systems that come equipped with Stinger missiles.

According to the Pentagon statement, the package will also include additional ammunition for High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) and other weapon systems, 100 High Mobility Multipurpose Wheeled Vehicles (HMMWVs),  400 grenade launchers, demolition equipment for obstacle clearing, and cold weather protective gear.

Sullivan also said the United States has detected some signs that Russian forces may be planning to withdraw from the Ukraine city of Kherson.

He said that the Russian withdrawal from some areas in Ukraine does not mean the Ukraine war is concluding. Sullivan added that Washington was not pressuring Ukraine to engage in diplomacy with Russia over the war.

Here are the other main headlines from the war in Ukraine on Thursday, November 10:

US revokes Russia's market economy status

The United States will no longer treat Russia as a market economy country, the US Commerce Department said, revoking the status granted two decades ago that limited the calculation of anti-dumping duties on Russian goods.

The move comes after Western nations imposed unprecedented sanctions on Russia following its invasion of Ukraine in February, while authorities in Moscow scrambled to shore up its economy and the ruble.

"This decision gives the United States the ability to apply the full force of the (anti-dumping) law to address the market distortions caused by increasing interference from the Russian government in their economy," the department said in a statement.

The determination of a market economy status is based on an evaluation of criteria such as currency convertibility, government control of means of production, and foreign investment climate.

"Commerce found extensive backtracking in these areas, particularly since the invasion of Ukraine," the department said.

41 settlements liberated in southern Ukraine — Zelenskyy

Ukrainian forces have liberated 41 settlements as they advance through the south of the country, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in his nightly video address.

"Today we have good news from the south," he said. "But although we are joyful, we must remember now and forever what this movement means — every step by our defence forces represents ... lives given for the freedom of Ukrainians."

Zelenskyy also said that Ukrainians have to go all the way "on the battlefield and in diplomacy" to return Ukrainian flags all over Ukraine.

Ukrainian troops pushed towards Kherson, after Russia ordered one of the war's most significant retreats. A forced pullout from Kherson, the only provincial capital Moscow had captured after invading Ukraine, would mark one of Russia's worst setbacks of the war.

Kyiv says Russia plans to 'ruin' Kherson

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has reacted skeptically to Moscow's announcement that Russian troops would withdraw from the southern Ukrainian city of Kherson. 

In a rare move, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said in a televised briefing on Wednesday that troops should leave the west bank of the Dnieper River where Kherson is situated. 

"The Russian troop units are manoeuvring to prepared position on the left bank of the Dnipro river in strict accordance with the approved plan," the Russian defence ministry said on Thursday.

The leader of the Russian constituent republic of Chechnya, Ramzan Kadyrov, said that he considers the Russian troop withdrawal to be the correct decision. 

But Zelenskyy cast doubt on the announcement, saying: "The enemy does not bring us gifts, does not make 'gestures of goodwill.'"

Zelenskyy added in his nightly address that any gains for Ukraine would only come "at the expense of "lives lost by our heroes."

"[Russia] wants to turn Kherson into a 'city of death.' [The Russian] military mines everything they can: apartments, sewers. Artillery on the left bank plans to turn the city into ruins," Zelenskyy's adviser Mykhailo Podolyak said on Thursday.

A British defense intelligence update on Thursday said Russian forces "had been placed under pressure by Ukrainian strikes on Russia's resupply routes."

According to the update, the withdrawal would likely take days as Russia's forces destroyed bridges and "laid mines" to stall advancing Ukrainian troops.

British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak's office said he spoke with Zelenskyy on Thursday and agreed it was right to express caution about Russia's pullout "until the Ukrainian flag was raised over the city."

DW's correspondent in Kyiv, Nick Connolly, said the Russian televised announcement was inconsistent with Moscow's earlier withdrawals from occupied Ukrainian regions. 

"This is definitely a break in strategy. Also, all the talk about wanting to save Russian soldiers' lives ... that is also not something that really gels with what Russia has been doing elsewhere," Connolly said, adding that this has led Ukrainians to believe that the announcement is "a trap."   

Spain to send two more air defence systems to Ukraine

Spain is to send Ukraine two more HAWK surface-to-air missile launchers on top of the four it has already dispatched to counter the Russian invasion, the Spanish government said. "Two extra launchers will be sent" following a request from NATO, Defence Minister Margarita Robles said.

Madrid at the start of the month said it was sending anti-missile and air defence systems, including four HAWK missile launchers and an Aspide surface-to-air missile system.

"We are firmly committed to Ukraine because we understand that it is exercising its legitimate right to self-defence," Robles said.

Her ministry said that 64 members of the Ukrainian military would be trained in the central Spanish city of Toledo from next week on deactivating explosives, mine clearance and sharpshooting.

Twenty-one other Ukrainian soldiers are being trained to handle 105/14 howitzers in the southern city of Almeria, it added, and another 19 have learnt how to use the Aspide air defence system. The ministry says Spain is to train around 400 Ukrainian soldiers every two months.

EU won't recognize Russian passports from occupied Ukraine

The European Union said it will not recognize Russian passports issued in regions of Ukraine annexed by Moscow.

The move, which also covers two Kremlin-controlled areas of Georgia, means Russian travel documents given to residents of those regions cannot be used to get visas or to enter the Schengen zone.
"This decision is a response to Russia's unprovoked and unjustified military aggression against Ukraine and Russia's practice of issuing Russian international passports to residents of the occupied regions," the European Council said in a statement.

The move still needs to be formally signed off by the European Parliament and EU member states.

In September, Russian President Vladimir Putin laid claim to four regions of Ukraine in a unilateral declaration widely rejected by the international community. Moscow also annexed Ukraine's Crimea peninsula in 2014.

Putin won't attend G20 summit in Bali

Russian President Vladimir Putin will not travel to Bali to attend the G20 summit next week, but Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov will be there, officials said.

Putin had long left open his participation in the meeting on November 15 and 16. Indonesian President Joko Widodo had invited him to the summit of 20 major industrialized nations despite Russia's invasion of Ukraine and the international condemnation.

"The Russian foreign minister will come in person," said Jodi Mahardi, a spokesperson for the Indonesian Ministry of Investment responsible for coordinating the summit. The Kremlin later confirmed this.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and some Western countries had called for Russia to be expelled from the G20. Zelenskyy is likely to attend the Bali summit via video link, presidential spokesman Serhiy Nykyforov has said.

NATO says Russia 'coming under heavy pressure'

NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said he was waiting to see how Russia's retreat from Kherson plays out, and that, if confirmed, it would be "another victory for Ukraine." 

"We have to see how the situation on the ground develops in the coming days. But what is clear is that Russia is under heavy pressure," he told reporters in Rome following a meeting with new Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni.

He added that NATO would support Ukraine "for as long as it takes."

"The unprecedented support that NATO allies, including Italy, has provided is making a difference on the battleground every day and remains vital for the Ukrainian progress," he said.

Meloni, for her part, said her government was committed to defending "the territorial integrity, sovereignty and freedom of Ukraine." 

Top US general estimates 100,000 Russian casualties

Top US General Mark Milley said more than 100,000 Russian military personnel have been killed or injured in Ukraine. 

"Same thing probably on the Ukrainian side," Milley said in remarks in New York. 

He also said that there was a possibility for negotiations to end the war as military victory might not be possible for both sides.      

"There has to be a mutual recognition that military victory is probably in the true sense of the word maybe not achievable through military means, and therefore you need to turn to other means," Milley said.

"There's ... an opportunity here, a window of opportunity for negotiation."

Amnesty labels Russia's 'transfer' of civilians a war crime 

Human rights organization Amnesty International has accused Russia of unlawfully transferring and deporting civilians from occupied parts of Ukraine.

In a report published Thursday, it alleged the actions amounted to war crimes and likely crimes against humanity.

According to the rights group, Russian forces have been forcibly moving civilians from occupied areas into Russian-controlled territory or into Russia itself.

It also alleged that children had been separated from their families, and that people had been subjected to "abusive screening processes — known as 'filtration' — which sometimes resulted in arbitrary detention, torture, and other ill-treatment."

"Separating children from their families and forcing people hundreds of kilometers from their homes are further proof of the severe suffering Russia's invasion has inflicted on Ukraine's civilians," said Agnes Callamard, Amnesty's secretary general.

The rights group said it interviewed 88 people, most of them civilians from the Black Sea port of Mariupol, as well as residents from the Kharkiv, Lugansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions.

Moscow has been evacuating thousands of civilians, in particular from the Kherson area, in recent weeks in what Kyiv has described as a forced deportation.

Ukraine signs peace accord with Southeast Asian bloc

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba signed a treaty on cooperation with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) in the latest bid by Kyiv to shore up international support. 

The highly symbolic move comes despite the ASEAN nations being rather reserved in their stance toward Russia's war on Ukraine.

US President Joe Biden is set to attend the ASEAN summit in person.

Russian President Vladimir Putin won't attend the summit in Cambodia, nor will he go to the upcoming G20 meeting in Indonesia. Moscow will instead send Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

Asked to comment on Ukraine's presence at the meetings, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova said "This theme in general has nothing to do with us."

fb/wmr (AFP, AP, dpa, Reuters)